Local News

Log Lane votes not to pay comp time for deputy marshal

Board approves payables after initially voting 'no'

ByJENNI GRUBBS Times Staff Writer

Posted:
07/11/2013 10:37:37 AM MDT

Log Lane Village resident Bert Brown holds up the results of a survey he collected in the town asking fellow residents if they though any of the town employees should be fired during the public comment portion of the Log Lane Village Board of Trustees meeting Wednesday, July 11, 2013, at Log Lane Town Hall. Brown told the trustees that he had gathered 135 no and five yes answers on the survey. (Jenni Grubbs/Fort Morgan Times)

The Log Lane Village Board of Trustees on Wednesday night voted 4-3 against paying Dep. Marshal Cindy Cook for comp time Marshal Fred Cook had reported she had accrued.

The trustees voting against the motion, Dee Jimenez, Rose Condos, Roy Nipper and Jeanie Cardona, said they wanted more documentation for the hours worked, with that documentation specifically coming from Cindy Cook, rather than from the marshal.

But Town Attorney Carl McGuire advised the board after the fact that there could be conflict of interest problems with Cardona voting on anything related to the marshal's office, since she had recently been arrested by Fred Cook.

That happened Friday with an arrest warrant for Cardona on one felony count of aiding an escape, allegedly related to her former brother-in-law, Enrique Cardona, according to Fred Cook.

Jeanie Cardona was then taken to jail, but was released Saturday on a $10,000 bond, according to records from Morgan County District Court. Formal charges had not been filed in the case as of Wednesday night, and no court appearance had been set yet.

McGuire emphasized that Jeanie Cardona is "innocent until proven guilty" and declined to comment on the situation beyond the advice that she abstain on votes related to the marshal's office.

Jeanie Cardona made no comments on McGuire's advice and still voted on several such issues, although she abstained the on the final issue.

That was a 5-1-1 vote to rescind a prior decision by the board not to pay the town's June 13 to July 10 payables. Jimenez was the lone no vote on this, and Jeanie Cardona abstained.

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The payables were part of the consent agenda, which takes one vote to pay all the town's bills, including payroll and invoices.

Initially, part of the board took issue with paying an invoice of a little more than $1,020 from McGuire for his legal services.

Condos said she was concerned that McGuire was including things on the bill that had been for representing the town employees, not the town.

The attorney flatly denied that, saying it would be conflict of interest for him to provide legal services to the town employees when he represented the town.

He said that part of the bill was for researching issues related to the board's recent choice to attempt to fire Town Clerk Kim Alva and then the decision instead to present her with a just cause for termination charge. McGuire said he was worried about the town getting sued.

When the motion about approving the payables first came up, it was defeated 4-3, with Jeanie Cardona, Condos, Jimenez and Nipper voting no and Trustees Rick Alva and Martha Manion and Mayor Ed Parker voting yes.

McGuire then advised the board that he would have to call all of the people and businesses that already had been paid and get the money back, since this was supposed to be the ratification of making those payments.

Not long after that and the vote to not pay Cindy Cook, McGuire put the board on notice that he intended to resign after that night's meeting concluded.

"I have become ineffective for the board," he said. "This will be my last meeting. I'm not keeping you guys from staying out of trouble."

At the end of the meeting, though, Condos called for a reconsideration of the vote on the payables, which ended in the payments already made getting ratified by the board, including McGuire's bill.

"I think it's only fair we pay the bills," Condos said.

Other agenda items

The board also approved purchasing a time clock for town employees and requiring daily hand-written logs of hours worked and what was done during that time.

These two issues had been ongoing points of contention among factions on the board and with the employees.

Fred Cook and Public Works Director Bert Kammerzell, who was on vacation this week, had previously expressed doubt about the effectiveness of the time clock, considering late-night emergency calls to which they each respond without first going to Town Hall to clock in.

And Cook had previously pointed out that he clocks in and out every time he checks in with the Morgan County Communications Center.

But a majority of the board wanted the written logs for greater accountability.

"The employee handbook says the police office is to provide a daily log," Condos said. "What's so hard about that?"

Jimenez said that it was "time to get back to following" the town's employee handbook.

Fred Cook pointed out that while it was normal to fill out hand-written daily logs "years ago," modern technology had made that redundant.

Condos then brought up her concerns about the marshal responding to calls outside of Log Lane as part of why she wanted the daily logs and how much time was spent doing that.

That led to more discussion of the town's unwritten mutual-aid agreement with the Morgan County Sheriff's Office and how the marshal helping with those calls means the sheriff's office helps with Log Lane calls, with neither law enforcement entity billing the other for related services.

Jimenez said she just wanted to know what the marshal's office was doing while on the clock.

"If I were to write that down, you would accuse me of falsifying it," Fred Cook said.

In another split vote, the board also approved a motion to put decals on "all town vehicles" identifying them as belonging to Log Lane Village, with Condos volunteering to pay for this to happen.

Fred Cook vigorously objected to this action.

"When you make the decision to put those decals on (the marshal's office vehicles, ask yourself if it's worth jeopardizing an officer's life," he said, referring to undercover operations.

Parker called it "a waste of money," and McGuire said if the board was worried about the budget and spending caps, it might be "an unwise expenditure."

But Condos did say she would cover the cost.

The board also tabled possibly changing the town employees' health insurance benefit's costs.

Jimenez reiterated her position that town employees should be paying part of the costs, instead of the town footing the whole bill.

Parker said he thought it sounded like she wanted to "punish" Fred Cook for asking to be paid for his comp time, which she denied.

McGuire advised the trustees that they needed first to look at what compensation packages were offered to the employees when they were hired and what contracts were in effect before making decisions about this, especially mid-year.

And the board heard from the town clerk that the employee spending policy discussed at both the last meeting and work session was something that been approved by the board.

The policy adopted by the board stated that employees could spend up to $200, but $201 to $500 needed approval by the mayor and one trustee, according to meeting minutes Kim Alva read out loud. And expenditures of more than $500 required approval by a majority of the full board.

Condos said that her concern was that the payables had been running "way over budget" for some things.

McGuire suggested that the board address this at a work session by going over the budget and what already had been spent, and that a supplemental budget then could be adopted to account for the differences or needed cuts for the rest of the year.

He said this was part of "being good stewards" of the town's money.

And the board also tabled a discussion about taking the town's inventory, as Kammerzell was on vacation and it is the Public Works Department's inventory that has not yet been completed.

On feral cats, the board tabled the issue, as Jeanie Cardona was not able to get the information she had been directed to bring back to the meeting, as a phone message she left had not been returned in time.

However, McGuire indicated that the town could adopt an ordinance concerning density and licensing of cats to limit the number of animals per site, as the board recently did with dogs.

He said that with such an ordinance in place, animals could be held for up to 72 hours, and if not claimed they could be euthanized -- but at the town's cost.

Reports

During his report, Fred Cook pointed out that the woman he wanted to hire as a part-time deputy was there and ready to be interviewed by the board.

But the board tabled that issue after having Kim Alva look up in the previous meeting minutes whether Fred Cook had gotten the authorization to go ahead and hire the woman.

This authorization was found not to have been in the minutes, and the board tabled the issue until the trustees could review all applications for part-time deputy and conduct interviews.

In his report, McGuire also asked the board what its intentions were on bringing a formal just cause charge against Kim Alva.

He warned the board that there was a possibility of a hostile work environment being created and said that he needed to know if he needed to find "at least three" attorneys to help with the quasi-judicial process of holding a show cause hearing to determine if the town clerk should be terminated.

He also expressed concern about whether there was enough of a quorum on the board that would be impartial enough to participate in the quasi-judicial process, which requires objectivity going into it and consideration of presented evidence, not a predetermined outcome.

"It's going to be very expensive," if it proceeds, Parker said.

"We're working on that right now," Jimenez told McGuire, of the possible formal just cause complaint against Kim Alva.

"All you are doing is running up your legal bills and then refusing to pay me," a noticeably upset McGuire said.

Jimenez said part of why it was taking a while to put the complaint together was getting access to the employee application.

She said that once that happened, it should only take a couple days to put the formal complaint together.

But McGuire was not given express direction by the board Wednesday night to start looking for legal help for the town at a potential just cause hearing.

Also, on McGuire's advice, the board decided to hold a work session soon to start figuring out what to do about regulating or banning commercial recreational marijuana facilities, as per Amendment 64.

"The board needs to look forward on this issue and needs to address it," he said.

There is a moratorium on commercial recreational marijuana facilities in the town in place through Oct. 31.

"Tell me what issues you guys are thinking about and how you would like to proceed," McGuire said. "I could go 15 directions and 14 would be wrong."

But all of these potential actions by McGuire also are dependent upon whether he follows through with resigning from being the Log Lane Village attorney.

Citizens' comments

The board also heard from quite a few people during the citizens' comments portion of the meeting, including two residents sharing the results of surveys they had been taking related to concerns about the board, its actions and its ability to function.

Bert Brown said that after the June regular and special board meetings he was "so disappointed" that he had conducted a survey of people around town.

He held up a lengthy list of the 140 signed answers, including 135 for no and five for yes, he collected to answer the question, "Do you have any reason fire any Log Lane Village employee?"

Brown said that during the collection process he had "met some of the nicest people I've ever met" and heard stories from them about each of the town employees doing good things and serving the community.

He said that four out of seven board members wanting to fire town employees was not representative of the town's desires from what had had found.

"Before you embarrass this town any more and cost this town any more, I wish you would resign," he said, directing this comment to Condos, Jimenez, Jeanie Cardona and Nipper. "Ever since Mr. (Paul) Vowell resigned, it's been downhill since then. It's a grudge match."

She said she had started this by posting it at Lil' Greeney's Liquor store and that it had been one signature shy of full when it was stolen, which store owner Robin Mastin confirmed.

This also had been reported to the marshal's office, according to Fred Cook.

Gonzalez started over, though, she said, and now is seeking more signatures on new forms and intended to find out more about starting formal recall efforts.

"They were all four bad, just working for themselves," she said. "Obviously, there's a problem if all these people are willing to sign my petition. I'm a nobody."

Town resident Bud Anderson asked why all the people he heard complaining about the board had not appeared on a ballot or applied when board vacancies had come up.

Town resident Raina Hallahan noted the private security guards at the meeting and asked the board members who had brought them to the meeting, "If you're so afraid of everyone and need security, why are you still on the board?"

Jimenez responded that the security was there "because this board basically became divided" and that she did not trust Fred Cook.

"We just don't feel comfortable," she said.

Town resident Sienna Bowen responded, pointing out that the marshal had acted to protect the board and keep order when a fight nearly broke out at a previous meeting.

Brown also asked everyone at the meeting to ask McGuire not to resign, drawing loud applause.

The board also heard comments about weeds and people keeping roosters in the town, and McGuire explained the related ordinances and encouraged people to file formal complaints if they have such concerns and want the town to investigate and possibly take action.

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